Story of the World: Chapter 2

This week we finished Chapter 2 of SOTW.  In this chapter we learned about the Egyptians and the Nile River.  We learned why the Nile was so important to the Egyptians and how it flooded predictably at the same time each year which allowed the farmers to plan ahead and plant in the fertile soil once the floodwaters receded.  We also learned about the battle between the kings of Upper and Lower Egypt and how the "White King" of Upper Egypt, King Narmer, finally defeated the "Red King" of lower Egypt.  From that point on, the kind of Egypt's crown was red and white, representing the combined Upper and Lower kingdoms. 

The boys completed the map activity from the SOTW Activity Guide.  They traced the Nile in blue and also colored the Red and Mediterranean Seas blue.  Then they colored a green border along the Nile which represents the fertile silt deposited by the flood waters.  The remaining land was colored tan or yellow to show the desert.  These maps were then glued into their history notebooks as shown below.  I thought they did a great job!!

On our second day of history, we learned about the myth of Osiris and his brother, Set.  A perfect example of an UNLOVING brotherly relationship!!  Set tricked Osiris into getting into a coffin, closed the lid and threw him into the Nile River to drown.  Osiris' widow, Isis, was so bereaved that she cried a river of tears.  The Nile also mourned the loss of Osiris and ran dry, causing a drought.  Isis wrapped Osiris' body in cloth, making the first mummy, but then Osiris came back to life.  The river was so overjoyed with Osiris' return that it filled up and overflowed it's banks.  And that is why the Nile river floods every year............according to Egyptian mythology.  After reading about this, we made our own model of the Nile river using the directions in the Activity Guide.  We flooded the river and set it outside on our deck.  Hopefully grass will grow along its' banks soon.  My little guy wondered a few hours later why it hadn't grown yet!!  He also said we should throw "that guy" (Osiris) into the river like in the story.  (We have an Egyptian TOOB of figures that has Osiris in it.)  I was just glad to know he had listened to the story since he is pretty fidgety during our read alouds!!

Story of the World: Chapter 1

This week we spent two days reading Chapter 1 of SOTW.  We learned about nomads and what they ate (lizards, yuck!) and the boys completed a lapbook component with pictures of the various foods of nomads.  I forgot to take a picture of it though! 

On our second history day, we journeyed into a deep, dark cave (my husband's "mancave" in the basement........one of the only rooms in our house without windows) armed only with our torch (a small flashlight).  We quickly built a fire (lit a candle) for warmth and for cooking.

Once in the cave we decided to do some cave paintings to let future generations know more about us.  Below are the ones we did.  I had to take these with the light on to show them, but we drew them by candlelight (and a little flashlight).  This was a fun experience that I hope the boys will remember.

Story of the World (SOTW): Introduction

I like that most of the chapters in SOTW are easily broken up into two parts.  We will be studying history twice a week and science twice, so this easily fits into our schedule.  We did the introduction over two days this week.  In the introductory chapter we learned about what history is, what archaeology is, and how we can find out about the lives of people who lived long ago without talking to them or interviewing them.

After listening to the first half of the chapter, we made a family timeline and recorded major events from the year 1900 through 2011.  I just taped a bunch of papers together and made the line with a marker, then the boys helped me figure out where to mark birthdays, marriages, etc. We're planning to hang this in the schoolroom and add to it as we grow!  I also showed them how we could take a "piece" of the timeline and break it down into smaller parts, such as a timeline just for 2011 broken into months.

We are also going to make lapbooks for each chapter.  Fortunately, I had found and saved this awesome lapbook for SOTW Volume 1 a while ago.  Instead of putting our components on file folders, we're putting them into a blank spiral bound book.  It will be much easier to store!!  Below you can see the cover of my oldest son's book.  We just printed out the cover page and glued it to the front of the blank book.

For Chapter 0 (the introduction!), we added a pocket about "What is History?"  I just had my first grader do the pocket.  However, for my fourth grader, I had him do the pocket with pictures and then write a short paragraph about what he learned about "what is history?".  We then folded his little "report" and added it to the pocket.  His lapbook pages are shown in the next two photos.

For the second part of the chapter we learned about what archaeologists do and we had our own dig!!  This is an idea from the Activity Guide, but I loved seeing how Satori and her mom did a similar dig over at Satori Smiles.  Below are photos from our dig.

I mixed up sand, cornstarch, and water to make the sand hold together a bit more than it would otherwise.  Then I put it into a metal cake pan (after I'd put a bunch of "artifacts" into the bottom of the pan) and marked off a grid with pieces of string.  I showed the boys how archaeologists excavate one area at a time.  Luckily, we took a field trip a few weeks ago to a real dig site and I was able to show them a photo of an area marked off into a grid with trenches.  If it weren't for the wonderful flexibility of homeschooling, they probably wouldn't have had a real-life experience like that to tie into their learning.  

We "excavated" into a colander to be sure we didn't miss any little pieces.

When we found something, we put it into a baggie and labeled the bag with the coordinates of the square we'd found it in.

I had made up a grid worksheet for each of them to record their finds.  They had these on clipboards and it was all very official and very fun!!  So............no regrets about staying up until after midnight to get this activity prepped.  It was totally worth it!!  You can see my 4th grader's grid below.

So here's the deal..........

In THIS POST I explained that I have been considering making some changes to our program for this year.  I've now made those changes and I feel SO MUCH BETTER about what we're doing!!  I promised to explain what I'd decided, so I'll do that now.

Our major change is that I've decided to put aside A World of Adventure for a few years until both of my boys fall into the age range that is intended for which is 4th through 8th grade.  I was having a hard time with the difficulty of the literature selections even for my oldest son.  And it was also really hard for me to keep my youngest son involved.  The publisher does offer a companion curriculum for adapting it for younger students.  Still, I feel sure that the direction we have chosen to take is best for us this year.  I want to restate that I do think AWOA is a really great curriculum.  We were not unhappy with it; it just wasn't a good fit for us at this time.

For my oldest son's literature I am going to let him choose which chapter books we'll read.  Now we are working on The Cricket in Time Square.  I'll write a whole post on our work with that book once we've finished.  I love this book so much and am so glad he chose it.  George Seldin's writing and characters remind me a lot of E.B. White who I also love as an author.

For language arts we are adding in Easy Grammar (4th and 5th grade level).  We've just barely started this.  I had managed to get a copy for a great price at a used curriculum sale this summer.  I am also considering Winning with Writing for a writing curriculum for him.  It is very reasonably priced and looks really good.

For history we are going to use The Story of the World.  I already had Volume 1 and the Activity Guide and was originally planning to use it before I chose AWOA instead.  We have done the first chapter this week and are LOVING it!!!  I will be posting more about it soon.  With all the references in the AG I'm easily able to add extra reading and writing for my 4th grader to amp up the challenge for him.  I'm SO excited about this!

Another change I'm really excited about is that this week (tomorrow) we'll be starting a new science curriculum.  Again, I had originally wanted to use Real Science Odyssey from Pandia Press for science.  Then I chose AWOA and decided not to order.  Through the end of September Pandia Press is offering a discount on their ebooks and I jumped on it and ordered the Chemistry curriculum.  It is intended for Grades 2-5, but the labs are hands-on and the text is written just right for children so I think my first grader will do fine with a bit of help on some of the lab sheets.  My husband (who has a PhD in science) teaches science to the boys on Thursday mornings while I teach Kindermusik in our home studio.  He'll do one lab with them a week and I'll do one.  I have to admit that I'm so excited about this curriculum that I'm a bit disappointed I don't get to do it all.  Admittedly, he's way more qualified than me to answer their questions!!

I can't tell you  how much better I feel now.  When I made my curriculum decisions last spring as a new homeschooler I really wanted something I could open to tell me what to do each day, especially for my oldest.  Even though I'm a certified, licensed teacher and have taught for 20 years, this made me feel better.  What I should have know is that even when I taught in public and private school settings, I ALWAYS had to tweak everything and add in lots of my own activities and ideas.  It's just the way I love to teach.  The changes I've made much better reflect how I love to plan and teach.  So it's all good.  Can't wait to post more soon!